


Thinking out Loud

by RamblingPug



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/M, WIP, sad stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-03
Packaged: 2018-08-19 09:33:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8200192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RamblingPug/pseuds/RamblingPug
Summary: “Someday, when all this is over, when we have finally broken free of these walls,” he breathes, in the same wistful manner he does when he speaks about the endless ocean of the outside world, “I will marry her.”





	

_Summary : ****“Someday, when all this is over, when we have finally broken free of these walls,” he breathes, in the same wistful manner he does when he speaks about the endless ocean of the outside world, “I will marry her.”_

 

They sit by the fire, the entire lot of the 104th, watching the golden crackles of heat under the moonlight. Well most of them do.

Armin, instead, watches Mikasa, cutting the sparse food that they had managed to find and throwing it into the pot boiling over the fire. He watches her tug at her scarf and make sure it doesn't catch fire when she stands close to the coals.

The same old feeling he's known ever since he was a child begins to well up inside him, torrid and unrestrained, his eyes sparkling the most stricken adoration. The only difference is that now the words inside him struggle in their confines, beating their way to an escape.

“Someday, when all this is over, when we have finally broken free of these walls,” he breathes, in the same wistful manner he does when he speaks about the endless ocean of the outside world, “I will marry her.”

His words are so soft, so light, they are almost carried away by the midnight breeze but Eren hears them, just as he always hears everything that Armin dreams of.

He turns to look at him, but his confession is not directed at him, it is merely spoken as if it were an admission he wished would carry till the girl he gazed at.

Eren can feel his heart tugging in the most painful way, a creeping insecurity overcoming him. He should've known. That even though they have always been close, reading right through each other, always looking out for the other, there has always been a corner of their hearts too blind to notice a mirroring affection for the girl who had stood next to them in every second of their journey.

They had always shared the same hopes, the same dreams, the same fears but he wonders when this had happened, when exactly he and Armin had begun to share the very same love, nurtured carefully in secret, hidden away from each other. He laughs and he hopes his childish jealousy isn't too obvious. “Idiot,” he tries to joke, and Armin has the grace to look sheepish. “This is hardly the time or place to be thinking about marriage.”

“Don't listen to him, Armin,” Mikasa says suddenly coming up from behind them, “I doubt he thinks of anything apart from killing titans.” She shoots Eren a sarcastic look and he glares back at her.

A panicked blush shoots across Armin’s cheeks, wondering if she had heard the whole thing. He’d never be able to look her in the eye again if she was aware of his feelings…

“So,” she pipes up, handing him his bowl, “what's all this about you thinking of marriage?”

So she hadn't heard, after all. Thank god.

“I was just t-thinking,” he stuttered, eyes trained on the ground, “That it would be nice. Having a home to come home to, a family and all that...”

She doesn't say anything, just sips on her soup quietly. He knows how she feels about family, that there is nothing in the world more important to her than that six letter world. He could give her that, someday. He could give her everything, a family, happiness, his _heart_.

“Do you ever think about it, Mikasa? Raising your own family, I mean?”

She smiles, a small, precious thing of beauty that he could never get enough of.

“I already have a family, Armin,” she says earnestly, “I don't know what I would do without the two of you.”

But Eren sees the wishful flicker in her normally impassive eyes, he knows that she dreams too.

And he doesn't know why but it makes him feel just a little bit guilty.

..

The forest is dark and Titans aren't supposed to come in here, but they do and they are everywhere, ruthless aberrants slamming into everyone in their way.

The whirring sound of the 3-D manoeuvre gear resounds throughout the filtered darkness, mingling cruelly with the screams and deadly crashes.

Mikasa is careful not to expend too much gas, because she's been in this position before, she knows she must conserve it to make sure all her comrades make it safely out of the forest. Her eyes search constantly for ungodly flashes of green light, her ears seeking the rampant roar of a newly transformed Titan. She prays that Eren is practiced enough with his gear that he doesn't resort to shifting. It isn't that she is uncomfortable with his Titan form, just that it is a source of constant nervousness for her comrades and nervous soldiers are quick to drop dead like flies.

She cuts through each deformed deadly mass that stumbles towards her efficiently, keeping her eyes peeled for the rest of them, when she hears a blood-curdling scream, shrill and so chillingly familiar. 

“Eren!” The voice screams and she knows instantly who it is.

Her heart clenches in terror, the worst possible scenarios playing continuously in her mind as she races through the trees searching desperately for the source of that voice.

_Please be okay, Eren. Don't die._

A mindless chant she repeats, over and over like a mantra, till she hears another scream that terrorises her to the very core.

“Mikasa!”

“Shit,” she grits out, because _why was he screaming her name?_

_Was it already too late?_

_Was he just another bug the Titans squashed on their way?_

The questions rattle inside her mind, her anxiety taking over as she almost crashes into a tree branch.

But when she reaches the golden haired boy who screamed so horribly, she is met with a sight completely different from what she had imagined.

In the smallest clearing in the forest, dangling from the mouth of the ugliest, most repugnant, swollen headed Titan she had ever seen, was Armin, legs stuck in its rapacious mouth. His only form of defense, his blades, had dropped to the ground ages ago and now he was left with only hope that one of his friends would find him.

Tears streamed uncontrollably from his eyes, the desperation in his screams rising with every second. It occurs to him that he is possibly the most Pathetic member of the Survey Corps, screaming for someone to come save him, but his life was more precious to him than some half-assed notion of dignity.

There were too many things he had to do, too many dreams he had to fulfil… Too much love locked inside him that he had yet to give.

With a whir and a dazzling display of efficiency her blade came crashing down on its neck, taking it down with one blow.

But when the Titan fell, its jaws snapped shut and she heard another scream, this one in vicious pain.

“Armin!” She can hear Eren, frantic, rushing to catch him as he falls out of the Titan’s mouth, bloodied and broken.

She is anything but prepared for the sight that awaits her, blood splattering on her face as his leg separates from him.

He screams, again, pain and anguish ripping through him at the sight of his leg fallen, broken on the mud beside him.

The scene replays in slow motion, every small detail sinking into her only now. Was it her careless blow that had snapped the Titan’s jaws shut? Was it because of her lack of judgement that Armin’s limb was hacked off?

She watches as Eren lays him down, trying to talk to him and her gear drops out of her clutches. Her legs move of her own accord,  and she trips over overgrown tree roots that she plainly didn’t see, wincing as her ankle twisted further as she ran.

But Armin screams and screams, howls of ear-shattering pain, his eyes hollowing out into an injured frenzy of fear. “Eren,” he manages, sputtering blood, “... Mikasa...” desperate, because Armin can feel the consciousness oozing out along with his blood. He grasps Eren’s hand with all the strength he can muster, whispering, “Er…n, promi… se…”

Tears leak out of Eren’s eyes, a habit, that much to his annoyance, he’s never been able to outgrow, but he takes off his uniform jacket and wraps it around his injured friend. “...Sssh, Armin, don’t speak, Mikasa’ll be here any minute, she’ll know what to do.” _She’ll save you,_ is what he wants to say, because it was Mikasa, and she could do anything, but with each passing moment, even Eren was finding it difficult to believe it.  

“... You have... to tell her…” Armin chokes out, and amidst the fear, the blood, and the cold dread that had started to creep down his spine, Eren understands. He understands, because he knows, not only because Armin was his best friend, but because he sees that look, that desperation, and selfishly, enviously, has always pretended not to.

“... You tell her yourself,”  he says stiffly, even though he’s never, ever wanted him to, “If you love her, then stay with us and tell her yourself, goddammit!”

By the time Mikasa gets to them, Armin’s incoherent whispers have calmed but this is only scarier because his body is shivering, his temperature dropping down to an unnatural cold.

Ever since they were children, they had always been there for Armin, sticking up to his bullies, protecting him from their fists, how much ever Armin had loathed his own incapability to do so. But now, when the undisputable tendrils of fear swirled in

“Come on, man,” Eren chokes out, “You can't die on me. We haven't even made it out yet.” But he doesn't say anything, just looks upward with vacant eyes, the blue in his eyes turning duller by the second.

An angry tear slips from Eren’s eyes. “... I'll kill them,” he vows, just like he does every single day, but it’s weaker now, fading, along with dreams of mountains of fire, and endless blue, “I'll kill each and every one of them...”

Mikasa doesn't speak, she can't, the words catching in her throat and lodging there permanently, streaks of guilt streaming down her face.

“It's my fault,” she whispers, “I should have been more careful.” She tries her level best to rub some warmth into him but it doesn't work and soon even the shivering begins to stop.

“Stay with us, Armin, please,” she pleads, “please, you can't die. We need you.”

It's as if the life force is draining out of him along with the blood, and she rips off a portion of her shirt, tying it over his gaping wound. “Armin, don't leave me, please,” she whispers, hovering over him, cupping his face in her blood stained hands, shaking him to look at her.

She's lost too many people already, too much family, too many souls precious to her. She looks at the boy in front of her, real terror crushing her heart because Armin is too sweet, too precious to leave this world before her.

“... Please,” she sobs, tears falling from her eyes freely now, dropping like rain onto his bloodied face, “... Don't go...”

“Oi, Mikasa, you're squeezing him too hard,” Eren says hoarsely, trying to pry her hand off of his, because Armin isn’t moving anymore, and Mikasa isn’t willing to let go.

But she can’t take her hand from his, can't bring herself to detach herself from him, looking at his lifeless face with a frantic desperation, as if constant contact with him will channel some of her life force into him.

“... Mikasa, stop, please,” he begs, shaking her, because words aren’t getting through to her, aren’t getting past the empty catatonia that has taken over her.  “... It’s my fault,” she whispers, bloody hands clutching at her hair, “Eren, I…” and she looks at him, finally, her stare returning from the vacant hollow that had taken over it, tears streaming down and choking her, unable to believe the words in her mouth, “... I-I... _killed_ him.”

Large, fat drops of rain begin to fall from the clouds and it seems cruel, like the Gods are trying to wash away the existence of their best friend, of the young wide-eyed boy who had taught them how to dream. 

It’s almost a blur by the time Hanji and Levi arrive, and Eren is too dazed to even pay attention to what Hanji is doing to Armin. 

His eyes have clouded over, and there’s a sharp throbbing ache in his head, the only thing he’s aware of apart from Mikasa, shivering, painful, broken sobs, buried into his chest, and it feels like he’s watching not one, but two of the most important people in his life die a slow death right in front of him.

**TBC...**


End file.
